Significantly, RBS is further downsizing its Corporate and Investment Bank (CIB), in order to ‘create a more focused corporate and institutional bank’.

The report identifies the drivers for change being:

Returns are too low Costs are too high

Capital usage is too high

Operating risks are outside of our go-forward risk appetite

The CIB will reduce country operations from 51 in 2009, 38 in 2014 to a target of 13 by 2019.

RBS country footprint for CIB by 2019

The strategy for the CIB business will be to create a:

Strong focused product offering:

Risk management: FX, Rates (USD, GBP and EUR)

Debt Financing: DCM, Structured Finance, Loans (USD, GBP and EUR)

Transaction Services: UK focused cash, payments & trade

International capability: Full service to UK and Western European clients/counterparts (9 European offices)

Distribution and trading hubs in UK, US and Singapore

In terms of their online digital strategy, they are targeting a Single digital platform for customers by middle of 2016. RBS’s Single-Dealer Platform called RBSMarketplace and Agile Markets which powers its global FX business, are built using the Caplin Platform.

RBS FX scorecard: Below is my analysis of RBS FX performance, based on the EuroMoney FX ranking. The tables show overall ranking, as well as by client segment and geographic region – the lower the number, the higher the ranking. As can be seen, between 2007-14 RBS ranking has fallen in every category, although their real FX strength remains a strong corporate franchise and footprint in Western Europe, which align with their 2019 ambitions below.